PayPal Inc. co-founder and Affirm’s CEO Max Levchin on center stage during day one of Collision 2019 at Enercare Center in Toronto, Canada.
Vaughn Ridley | Sportsfile | Getty Images
LONDON — Buy now, pay later firm Affirm launched Monday its installment loans in the U.K., in the company’s first expansion overseas.
Founded in 2012, Affirm is an American fintech firm that offers flexible pay-over-time payment options. The company says it underwrites every individual transaction before making a lending decision, and doesn’t charge any late fees.
Affirm, which is authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority, said its U.K. offering will include interest-free and interest-bearing monthly payment options. Interest on its plans will be fixed and calculated on the original principal amount, meaning it won’t increase or compound.
The company’s expansion to the U.K. marks the first time it is launching in a market outside the U.S. and Canada. Globally, Affirm counts over 50 million users and more than 300,000 active merchants, including Amazon, Shopify and Walmart.
Among the first merchants offering Affirm as a payment method in the U.K. are Alternative Airlines, the flight booking website, and payments processing firm Fexco. Affirm said it expects to onboard more brands over the coming months.
Max Levchin, CEO of Affirm, told CNBC that the company had been working on its launch in the U.K. for over a year. The reason Affirm chose Britain as its first overseas expansion target was because it saw a lot of demand from merchants in the country, according to Levchin.
“It is a huge market, it’s English-speaking,” making it a great fit for the business, Levchin said in an interview last week ahead of Affirm’s U.K. launch. Affirm will eventually expand into other markets that aren’t English-speaking but this will take more work, he added.
“There are lots of competitors here who are doing a sensible job serving the market. But when we started doing merchant outreach, just to find out locally, is the market saturated? Does everybody feel well served?” Levchin said. “We got such an enormous amount of market pull. It kind of sealed the deal for us.”
Fierce competition
Competition is fierce in the U.K. financial technology space. In the buy now, pay later segment Affirm focuses on, the company will find no shortage of competition in the form of sizable players like Klarna, Block’s Clearpay, Zilch, and PayPal, which entered the BNPL market in 2020.
Where Affirm differs to some of those players, according to Levchin, is that its range of financing products offer customers the ability to pay purchases off over much lengthier periods. For example, Affirm offers payment programs that last as long as 36 months.
Affirm’s launch in the U.K. comes as the government is consulting on plans to regulate the buy now, pay later industry.
Among the key measures the government is considering, is plans to require BNPL providers to provide clear information to consumers, ensure people aren’t paying more than they can afford, and give customers rights for when issues arise.
“Generally speaking, we welcome regulation that is thoughtful, that pushes the work onto the market to do the right thing, but also knows how not to be too cumbersome on the end-customer,” Levchin said.
“Telling us do lots of work in the background before you lend money is great. We’re very good at automating. We’re very good at writing software. We’ll go do the work,” he added. “Pushing the onus on the consumer is dangerous.”
Affirm secured authorization from the Financial Conduct Authority, the country’s financial services watchdog, after months of discussions with the regulator, Levchin said. He added that the firm’s “pristine reputation” helped.
“We’ve never charged a penny of late fees. We don’t do deferred interest. We don’t do any sort of the anti-consumer stuff people struggle with,” Levchin told CNBC. “So we have this good, untarnished reputation of being just very thoughtfully pro-consumer. And merchants love that.”
Pictured here is a construction site of property developer Hongkong Land, in Shanghai on Nov. 4, 2024.
Feature China | Future Publishing | Getty Images
BEIJING – China is widely expected to unveil more stimulus on Friday after its parliament ends a five-day meeting.
Authorities here have ramped up stimulus announcements since late September, fueling a stock rally. President Xi Jinping led a meeting on Sept. 26 that called for strengthening fiscal and monetary support, and stopping the real estate market slump.
While the People’s Bank of China has already cut several interest rates, major increases in government debt and spending requires approval by the country’s parliament, called the National People’s Congress.
That approval could be granted at the weeklong meeting of the legislature’s standing committee. During a similar meeting in October of last year, authorities had approved a rare increase in China’s deficit to 3.8%, from 3%, according to state media.
Expectations for the scale of that fiscal support have increased after Donald Trump — who has threatened harsh tariffs on Chinese goods — won the U.S. presidential election this week. But some analysts are still cautious, warning that Beijing may remain conservative and not issue direct support to consumers.
When discussing planned fiscal support at a press conference last month, Minister of Finance Lan Fo’an emphasized the need to address local government debt problems.
At the parliamentary meeting so far, officials have reviewed a plan to increase the limit on how much debt local governments can issue, according to state media. The additional quota would go toward swapping out local governments’ hidden debt.
Nomura estimates that China has 50 trillion yuan to 60 trillion yuan ($7 trillion to $8.4 trillion) in such hidden debt, and expects Beijing could allow local authorities to increase deb issuance by 10 trillion yuan over the next few years.
That could save local governments 300 billion yuan in interest payments a year, Nomura said.
In recent years, the country’s real estate slump has drastically limited a significant source of local government revenues. Regional authorities have also had to spend on Covid-19 controls during the pandemic.
Even before then, local Chinese government debt had grown to 22% of GDP by the end of 2019, far more than the growth in revenue available to pay that debt, according to an International Monetary Fund report.
Check out the companies making headlines in extended trading: Rivian — The electric vehicle maker added nearly 2% despite missing on both top and bottom lines in the third quarter. Rivian posted an adjusted loss of 99 cents per share on $874 million in revenue. Analysts polled by LSEG had forecast a loss of 92 cents per share on revenue of $990 million. Pinterest — Shares tumbled 11% after the social media company posted weak guidance for its fourth-quarter revenue. Pinterest guided revenue to fall between $1.125 million and $1.145 million. The midpoint of the fourth-quarter guidance, $1.135 million, came below analysts’ estimates of $1.143 million, per LSEG. The company posted beats on the top and bottom lines in the third quarter. Block — Shares dipped 2% after the fintech firm reported a third-quarter revenue miss . Block posted sales of $5.98 billion, while analysts polled by LSEG had anticipated $6.24 billion. On the other hand, Block’s adjusted earnings of 88 cents per share beat analysts’ estimates by one cent. Airbnb — Shares of the online homestays company slipped nearly 3%. Airbnb posted third-quarter earnings of $2.13 per share, 1 cent shy of the consensus forecast, per LSEG. Quarterly revenue of $3.73 billion was slightly above analysts’ estimates for $3.72 billion. Akamai Technologies — Shares slid 6% as the cloud computing company issued disappointing full-year guidance. Akamai said its adjusted earnings for the period will range between $6.31 and $6.38 per share on revenue of $3.966 billion to $3.991 billion. Analysts polled by FactSet anticipated $6.43 per share in earnings and $3.99 billion in revenue. DraftKings — The sports betting company tumbled 4% after guidance missed the mark. DraftKings said its fourth-quarter adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization will range between $240 million and $280 million. Analysts polled by LSEG sought $340 million to $420 million. The company also fell short of the Street’s expectations in the third quarter. Sweetgreen — The salad chain dropped more than 10% after missing on top and bottom lines in the third quarter. Sweetgreen announced losses of 18 cents per share, while analysts had expected a loss of 13 cents per share, according to LSEG. Revenue of $173 million also fell short of the $175 million forecast by analysts. Toast — Shares of the restaurant management software company surged 19% on strong fourth-quarter guidance. Toast guided fourth-quarter adjusted EBITDA between $90 million and $100 million. Analysts polled by StreetAccount estimated $74.8 million. Third-quarter results also beat estimates on both top and bottom lines. Expedia Group — Shares of the travel service company jumped 3%. Expedia’s adjusted earnings for the third quarter came in at $6.13 per share, beating analysts’ call for $6.04 a share, per LSEG. Revenue came in at $4.06 billion and narrowly missing analysts’ forecast for $4.11 billion. The company also said Chief Financial Officer Julie Whalen will be stepping down from her role. Arista Networks — The computer networking company fell 6% despite third-quarter results that topped estimates. Arista Networks reported third-quarter adjusted earnings of $2.40 per share on revenue of $1.81 billion. Analysts had expected earnings of $2.08 per share on $1.74 billion in revenue. The company’s fourth-quarter revenue guidance range also beat forecasts. Arista Networks also announced a 4-for-1 stock split. Lucid Group — The electric car manufacturer advanced 6% after narrowly beating analysts’ expectations in the third quarter. Lucid reported an adjusted loss of 28 cents per share on revenue of $200 million in the period. Analysts polled by LSEG expected a loss of 30 cents per share and revenue of $198 million. The company also reaffirmed plans to produce about 9,000 vehicles this year, up 6.8% from 2023. Capri Holdings — The owner of Jimmy Choo lost 7% after results in the fiscal second quarter missed analysts’ estimates. Capri reported adjusted earnings of 65 cents per share on revenue of $1.08 billion, while the Street sought 75 cents a share in earnings and $1.18 billion in revenue, per LSEG. Revenue for Michael Kors and Versace also came up short of expectations. — CNBC’s Darla Mercado, Lisa Kailai Han and Alex Harring contributed reporting.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell speaks during a news conference following the Nov. 6-7, 2024, Federal Open Market Committee meeting at William McChesney Martin Jr. Federal Reserve Board Building in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 7, 2024.
Andrew Caballero-Reynolds | AFP | Getty Images
Expectations for a December interest rate cut remained strong after the Federal Reserve trimmed rates by a quarter percentage point in November, but market pricing is suggesting the likelihood of a “skip” in January.
On Thursday afternoon, the U.S. central bank lowered the federal funds rate, which determines what banks charge each other for overnight lending, to a target range of 4.5% to 4.75%.
Before the Fed released this decision at 2 p.m. ET, market pricing pointed toward a 67% chance of another quarter-point cut in December and a 33% chance of a pause that month, according to the CME FedWatch Tool.
The probability of a quarter-point December rate cut rose to more than 70% following the meeting, while the chances of a pause slipped to nearly 29%. Future rate probabilities found in the CME FedWatch Tool are derived from trading in 30-day fed funds futures contracts.
Meanwhile, the odds that the Federal Reserve would skip an interest rate cut in January was around 71%. This was slightly higher from 67% before the release of the Fed’s November decision on Thursday afternoon.